A Latter-day Saint apostle gave CBS News a tour of the Washington D.C. Temple. See what it reported.

For the primary time in 48 years, the doorways of the Washington D.C. Temple will open to most of the people for six weeks starting on April 28.

Elder David A. Bednar gave CBS Information Sunday Morning’s Ed O’Keefe and the community’s cameras an unique preview of the renovated temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The information journal aired a five-minute phase on Sunday.

CBS additionally posted on its YouTube channel a 100-second clip from one of many temple’s sealing rooms, the place Elder Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles supplied marriage recommendation based mostly on symbolism within the rooms the place Latter-day Saints might be certain collectively without end in an ordinance referred to as sealing.

Elder Bednar and his spouse, Sister Susan Bednar, confirmed O’Keefe the infinite reflections offered by dealing with mirrors as {couples} kneel at an altar to be sealed collectively.

“If Susan and I stand right here and look into these mirrors, if I take a look at Susan and Susan seems at me, you may see without end,” Elder Bednar stated. “But when I look into the mirror simply in my eyes, and Susan seems solely into her eyes, all you may see is your self. That’s all the wedding recommendation anyone ever wants.

“So long as I’m seeking to Susan and caring about her consolation and well-being, issues will work advantageous, if she’s doing the identical. But when I’m self-centered and egocentric, then it most likely doesn’t work very properly.”

The temple has been a landmark on the Capitol Beltway for space residents and worldwide guests since its development and first open home within the fall of 1974. After 758,000 folks toured the temple then, it was devoted and reserved just for Latter-day Saints who preserve commitments to dwell worthy of temple attendance.

Now the temple that stands on a outstanding hill 10 miles north of the White Home might be open once more for six weeks from April 28 and June 11, after media and VIP excursions over the subsequent 10 days. Free tickets to the open home might be reserved right here.

Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, who had a job within the Watergate courtroom proceedings as a younger lawyer, additionally was on the tour with Sister Kathy Christofferson.

O’Keefe famous that some say the way in which the temple rises above the Beltway reminds them of the Land of Oz.

Elder Christofferson stated the church hopes open home guests will come to see the temple “as one thing a lot, far more than Oz.”

The temple closed in 2018 for largely technical renovations. Work was accomplished in 2020 and an open home and dedication had been scheduled for fall and winter that 12 months earlier than the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted these plans.

CBS Sunday Morning host Jane Pauley launched O’Keefe’s phase.

“In a metropolis stuffed with inspiring monuments, one Washington, D.C., landmark has lengthy been one thing of a thriller. Till now,” she stated.

Elder Bednar instructed O’Keefe there’s a distinction between secrets and techniques and sacred house.

“Generally we’re accused of, ‘What are the key issues that you simply do within the temple?’ he stated. “They’re not secret; they’re sacred. And so we don’t converse of them casually or calmly as a result of, to us, they’re so central, so elementary and so necessary to how we dwell.”

O’Keefe famous the temple’s huge measurement — its six spires attain almost 300 ft — and its white Alabama marble.

The Washington D.C. Temple was the church’s solely temple east of the Mississippi when it was constructed. Church leaders meant it to be hanging and to be central to its message of the significance of household within the religion’s doctrine in regards to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

As soon as the Capital Beltway’s route was settled, church leaders moved the temple’s location on the hill by 60 ft so as to add to its prominence to beltway drivers, in response to historians.

Because the CBS tour entered the temple, O’Keefe requested the apostles and their wives if the information crew was strolling into one other realm.

“Sure, symbolically,” Elder Bednar stated. “We’re leaving the world and coming into a extra heavenly place the place we study God.”

O’Keefe famous that a lot of the areas inside are windowless, hushed and intimate.

“One room that does wow is the baptistry,” he stated, explaining that it’s a place for Latter-day Saints to be baptized on behalf of their ancestors who might select to simply accept or reject it within the afterlife.

The phase made it clear that the church’s public message a half century after the temple first opened remains to be centered round household. It additionally famous a more moderen message, that the church and its members now not refer themselves as Mormons, “emphasizing as a substitute what they share with different Christian faiths: a reverence for Christ,” O’Keefe stated.